Christmas music

(Newser) -
Nick Wilder says he enjoys a rousing rendition of holiday songs like "Jingle Bell Rock" as much as the next guy—but maybe just one rendition at a time, not around the clock every single day. That's the gist of the New York City attorney's suit he'...
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Carey is dethroned by The Shins

(Newser) -
Everywhere you go this holiday shopping season, Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" will be played. There's no escaping it—but, for the first time in decades, there's another song you might hear more often. That's right: For the first year since...
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Chris Klimek blames nostalgia, iTunes

(Newser) -
It has apparently become impossible to write a new Christmas classic. The holiday canon "isn’t just closed—it’s a location-undisclosed black site that’s locked down tighter than Santa’s workshop," observes Chris Klimek at Slate . The last song that really fits the bill is Mariah...
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Lots of blood vessels, researchers explain

(Newser) -
Everyone knows Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has "a very shiny nose" that even, some might say, "glows." But why? A new—and, The Local notes, tongue-in-cheek—investigation explains. Researchers in Norway and the Netherlands compared reindeer noses to human noses and found that reindeer have 25% more...
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Travolta, Newton-John team up for 'I Think You Might Like It'

(Newser) -
This somehow came to pass: John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John channel Grease's Danny and Sandy in a new video as they line dance and twang about Christmas together before ultimately driving off in a bright turquoise convertible. That description doesn't exactly sum up how awful the pair's...
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New music video not exactly well-received

(Newser) -
Justin Bieber teamed up with Mariah Carey for a new version of her '90s holiday classic, "All I Want for Christmas Is You," and the results are just about as bad as you'd expect. A sampling of the reactions:

Also, Santa? Didn't start out being so jolly

(Newser) -
Cheerful church groups love Christmas caroling, but the tradition was actually started by a bunch of lushes. Back when "Christmas" was actually a celebration of the winter solstice, poor carolers would go from house to house singing ... and also threatening to break windows if they were not plied with...
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Classic tune recalls America's loss of innocence on entering WWII

(Newser) -
The best-selling record of all time is a deceptively simple 15-line song about longing for home, writes Roy J. Harris for the Wall Street Journal , in a look at how the Bing Crosby-crooned, Irving Berlin-penned "White Christmas" has managed to sell an estimated 100 million copies over the last...
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Even so, the 'beloved iconoclast' puts together an interesting collection

(Newser) -
With the announcement of Bob Dylan’s Christmas in the Heart, “smirkers got smirkier”—you try picturing Dylan singing the lyric, “How’d ya like to hang a stocking on a great big coconut tree?” without smirking—but in the end, the collection is interesting, if a...
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Chronicle compiles list of reworked holiday faves

(Newser) -
Chestnuts may still be roasting on an open fire, but that doesn’t mean you can’t refresh your Christmas playlist. The San Francisco Chronicle compiles a list of new twists on old favorites to help you give the jingle bells a rest:

Baltimore teacher strikes a chord with song about Chinese food

(Newser) -
A band teacher at a Baltimore yeshiva is the latest YouTube celebrity thanks to his holiday spoof on the Jewish dilemma of what to do on Christmas. His video, "Chinese Food on Christmas," in which a rock band of faux Hasidic Jews jams for fellow members of the...
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Stations compete to kick off holiday programming earlier and earlier

(Newser) -
Apparently not content to subject listeners to "The Little Drummer Boy" in the traditional Thanksgiving-to-Christmas window, two Chicago radio stations switched to the all-fa-la-la-la-la, all-the-time holiday format today. The move is both the latest volley in a hot rivalry and a repeat of a strategy that paid off in...
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